This is best defined in JargonFile:hacker:

[ Originally, someone who makes furniture with an axe?

1. A person who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and how to stretch their capabilities, as opposed to most users, who prefer to learn only the minimum necessary.
   
   
2. One who programs enthusiastically (even obsessively) or who enjoys programming rather than just theorizing about programming.
   
   
3. A person capable of appreciating JargonFile:hack-value.
   
   
4. A person who is good at programming quickly.
   
   
5. An expert at a particular program, or one who frequently does work using it or on it; as in 'a Unix hacker'. (Definitions 1 through 5 are correlated, and people who fit them congregate.)
   
   
6. An expert or enthusiast of any kind. One might be an astronomy hacker, for example.
   
   
7. One who enjoys the intellectual challenge of creatively overcoming or circumventing limitations.
   
   
8. [deprecated? A malicious meddler who tries to discover sensitive information by poking around. Hence password hacker, network hacker.
   The correct term for this sense is JargonFile:cracker.

Hackers start at Geek and tend toward Nerd.

See also:

• A hacker glossary
• Care and Feeding Of Your Hacker